Pop'n Music Wiki:About
Pop'n Music Wiki is a communication and informational wiki that is based on the Pop'n Music seires. It is highly referred as the second wiki to be connected by BEMANI Wiki. What is Pop'n Music? Pop'n Music, mainly capitalized as pop'n music (abbreviated as PM or PnM) is one of the popular music/rhythm video games in Konami and was developed by Bemani. The video game was based as a childish design to Beatmania. Pop'n Music gains vast popularity for targeting younger audience, such as children; however in later installments, it is widely targeted for young adults, this is because of the complex gameplay. On September 1998, Pop'n Music debuted in Osaka, Japan. The first modern characters and some of the American songs can be used such as Mimi, Nyami, The King and Mary as your playable characters. It then spawn numerous of sequels and spinoffs: 24 main current installments, 15 main console installments, and 8 spin-offs. Controller The Pop'n Music controller is iconically known for its rectangular prism or round-looking trapezoid prism with colorful buttons: red, blue, green, yellow and white. Growing Legacy Eventually, Pop'n Music evolved from the original PlayStation to PlayStation 2, which added new characters, songs, designs and options. This also added Expert Mode (a course mode) with four songs in each course, Norma Select, Omake, Challenge Mode, Chou Challenge Mode, Battle, and NET Mode. , the first Pop'n Music stand-alone arcade game.]] Commonly, Pop'n Music rarely ship console releases as Pop'n Music keeps on evolving on arcades cabinets since 2007 through the present. Pop'n Music transformed newly, but removed some of the older or TV/Anime songs. At last, Pop'n Music was resembled to Paseli in Pop'n Music 19 TUNE STREET and so on. In 2012, Pop'n Music Sunny Park was released, but something common was changing: The level systems are changed to 1-50 and the categories are removed by new folders. International Reception Despite of Pop'n Music's rising popularity in Japan and South Korea, it was firmly to be a disappointment for some countries from the west, particularly in the United States. Many players think that the insane gameplay (if either Hyper or Extra difficuty was chosen) makes it too complex for both younger and older audiences in the west. There is no exception that Pop'n Music definitely have similar mechanics to the Beatmania franchise, since they both have extremely difficult gameplays. Later on, Konami ended up designing a game based off of Pop'n Music in the name of Beat'n Groovy, which receive negative and "melancholic" reviews, because of slow graphics and poor details of background designs. Pop'n Music gave its second chance to hit to the US. Eventually, Pop'n Music Wii is born in Japan, Europe, and North America. Instead of sending 90% of TV/Anime songs (which probably causes some licensing issues in other Japanese media companies), it sends random North American songs (ex. Bad Day, My Life Would Suck Without You, Pump Up the Volume, etc.), thus the opening theme and special song are arranged differently. Similar to Beat'n Groovy, Pop'n Music Wii received negative reviews, prior to American gamers' complaints of upsetting gameplay style, consisting of five buttons instead of the original 9 buttons; and character designs with beanie-shaped bodies and absent limbs; only the 9-button gameplay is for the 2P gameplay. Henceforth, the game was suppose to mechanize the gameplay to make it easier for western gamers. According to Metacritic, there are three critics giving Pop'n Music Wii negative reviews, stating it that it was a "frustrating experience". Not only does it have a terrible reception, but it has a few religion concerns. Poet, a character who debuted in Pop'n Music 3, has her halo removed in the western release. There is also a concern in the European release of Pop'n Music Wii, with one of the songs having explicit lyrics unhidden. Later on, Konami and Bemani released a location test in North America that contains the all-new four-button gameplay, based on the infamous Wii installment. This is later remodified for Japan as HELLO! POP'N MUSIC. The western releases of Pop'n Music cabinets are the limited releases on animation/gaming conventions (e.x. MomoCon in Atlanta, Georgia), along with the latest BEMANI releases; plus a skew of cabinets that remain in some arcades across North America. Pop'n Music is overwhemingly popular enough to have a fan comunnity and gaming events, because of a sheer amount of talented music/rhythm gamers in the gaming environment. This includes screenshots of players' results, fan art, and a fan simulator game based on the original DanceDanceRevolution games, Stepmania; including the Pop'n Music counterpart, Step'n Music, or a Pop'n Music mod to connect with the original Stepmania game. Sensitivity That does not just mean that Pop'n Music's advanced gameplay style makes some gamers from a western audience disappointed, but the content that is not suitable for younger poeple makes an uneasy feeling. The midly inappropriate content includes religious references, sexual references, and others. Religious Content Some characters have some religious issues towards western regions. Take for example, Poet's halo was removed in the Wii remake. There are also some religious references that relate to demonology or Satanism. Jack's birthdate is oddly written as June 66th; as it refers to the "Mark of the Beast", or basically Satan himself. Sattan's name is with the "t" added to Satan. Sexual Content Pop'n Music is no stranger for the content that involves sexual images physically or mentally. This series mainly have female characters with a little bit of sexual content that gamers or viewers find distracting. Drug and Alcohol Use One of Roku's likes was a dry sake, a variant of the Japanese rice wine. There is also a character named Shima, a lion who likes awamori, an Okinawan wine. Language and Gesture The one of the most swearing songs in the whole Pop'n series was DOLLAR DOLLAR. The only character with the inappropriate name was Dick. Trivia Original Allusions *The anime Watamote! includes a parody of the Pop'n Music arcade cabinet in one episode/chapter. *''Himouto! Umaru-chan'' includes the same parodic gameplay. Later on, Umaru-chan becomes a crossover character to promote the franchise.